A high-side driver of the configuration that an output transistor is connected between an output terminal (terminal connected with a load) and a power supply, is known as one of the semiconductor devices, each of which supplies the power to a load. In the high-side driver of such a configuration, by switching the output transistor, the supply of the power to the load is carried out or the supply of the power to the load is blocked off. For example, as an output transistor, a MOS transistor and an IGBT (insulated gate bipolar transistor) are used.
When the MOS transistor is used as the output transistor (hereinafter, such a MOS transistor is referred to as “an output MOS transistor”), a short-circuit switch is sometimes connected between the gate and the source in the output MOS transistor in the high-side driver (for example, reference to Patent Literature 1 (JP H03-198421A). The short-circuit switch is used to surely set the output MOS transistor to an OFF state by short-circuiting the gate and the source in the output MOS transistor, and the short-circuit switch is turned on when the output MOS transistor is turned off. As the short-circuit switch, a MOS transistor is generally used. Below, the MOS transistor which is used as the short-circuit switch is referred to as a short-circuit MOS transistor.